The Prince as a Manual for LeadershipChuck Russell

The Prince is more of a manual for successful leadership then a book. It was the first book written that did not make any mention of god and at the time was considered controversial for its lack of morals. The Prince describes the two principal types of governments: monarchies (dictatorships) and republics. Machiavelli's focus in The Prince is on monarchies. In his book Machiavelli describes in a very mechanical (orderly) fashion how one can come to power and hang on to their power, he lays out what one must do to hold onto their power. Machiavelli describes some qualities that will lead to a prince's downfall. He also describes other qualities that will allow him to succeed. The interesting part of this is that the qualities we find most moral in people are the ones that will lead to a prince's downfall in the eyes of Machiavelli. As he says, once in power a prince must do everything in his power to retain that power.

Machiavelli was born in Italy in 1468. Italy at the time of his birth was in a state of political mayhem, Italy was not united as we know it today. Very little is known about his early life, his child hood is a believed to be average. He wasn't noticed until the year 1450 when he got selected for a...